Armagedda
I Am
Eisenwald/Nordvis
Taken at face value, the “career” track of Swedish black metal outfit Armagedda seems beyond paradoxical. They only existed for four years (2000-2004), and released only a handful of split albums and EPs, and then silence. I assume that they realized they had gotten as far as they could with their original, somewhat gonzo mission: to use music as a carrier for a spiritual disease that would infect minds.
Good to have goals, though they may have fallen short of creating the fabled dreamweapon and destroying humanity. Instead, the duo of Gratav and A created a raw, grungy, grim racket that combines the chill winds of early Darkthrone with the garage-like teethgrind of the Gories, Motorhead, and Carpathian Forest. And now we have this posthumous EP of previously unreleased tracks. It’s no symbolic rosebud, just the next step in what was an increasingly misanthropic musical progression.
The production on the EP is only a tiny step beyond boombox-at-a-garage rehearsal, but the hiss and fidelity limitations act as another instrument, cloaking everything in heavy, fetid air and brittle echo. The vocals are a frantic and raspy growl/moan, the guitars are an icy, atonal mess, and the drums are heavy crashes, the straightforward rock beat lost in a cave. Despite the lengthy nature of the tracks, the material is surprisingly immediate and enjoyable.
Eisenwald: http://www.eisenton.de/index2.htm
